


In the Time of the Red Death

by TeamTwelve



Category: Pandemic Legacy (Board Games)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-10
Updated: 2019-08-10
Packaged: 2020-08-17 20:14:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20189830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TeamTwelve/pseuds/TeamTwelve
Summary: Pandemic Response Team 12 struggles to maintain hope in the face of darkness. Their loyalties and rivalries keep them going.





	In the Time of the Red Death

Scientist Mila Antonich pushed her chair back from the microscope and rubbed her eye with the sleeve of her lab coat. Lieutenant Weston was waiting on her opinion before closing the roads out of Sao Paulo; it looked like the virus was using a waterborne bacterium as a vector, but could they be sure? She had at least forty more slides to examine.

She stood up and walked to the break room. Maybe the coffee was still decent at ten p.m., or maybe she’d make a new pot. 

Weston was at the break room table, bent over a notebook and a tablet loaded with maps. She looked up when Antonich entered.

“Hey, Mila, you’re tired,” she said.

“No. It is my eyes only.” 

“You never admit to being tired, do you?” Weston teased. 

“Never am I tired,” Antonich corrected. This was a team joke; they were all half-dead some of the time, but only Antonich would never admit it. She took the water bottle from the fridge and held it against her eye. By common agreement, this bottle was never opened; it was the last of a shipment that came six months ago and there would be no more.

Weston took the coffee pot off the burner and sniffed it.

“Gross. I’ll make some new.”

“I’ll drink that,” Antonich said.

“No, I want some. Life is too short to drink burnt coffee. Especially at night.”

“I’ll do it,” Antonich said.

“No.”

Weston busied herself at the sink, setting up the coffeemaker and talking to Antonich over her shoulder. 

“I think we might need to close Sao Paulo no matter what,” she said. “I’ve been following the sanitation levels there and it’s bad. The water treatment plant is functioning at 30%.”

“We have nothing closed in South America yet,” said Antonich. “We’ll spark a panic.”

“We’d have to send in forces. I think it’s going to fall. Let’s sacrifice it.”  
Mila sighed and pressed the cool bottle against her face.

Casimir Peregrine, the dispatcher, backed into the room with a box in his arms.

“I’m starving,” he said. “Please tell me there is some food here. I’ll eat leftovers, I’ll eat condiments, I’ll eat cold pizza from the back of the fridge.” 

“I think there is some mustard for you,” Antonich said testily. Was he actually wearing eyeliner? Why was every restful moment in this station shattered by his clowning? She felt even more annoyed when Weston dug around in the cupboard and brought out a tin of tuna.

“Oh thank you, thank you so much,” Peregrine said, “I don’t suppose there is any mayo or a slice of bread or a even stale hamburger bun?” Antonich felt around in the junk drawer and found a packet of mayonnaise, which she threw at his head.

“I love you, Mila,” he said. Why could he never see how much she despised him? It was as if her contempt bounced off some thick shell of social stupidity.

The coffeemaker began its hissing and spitting. It hadn’t been working right, but if it died altogether, Mila would go back to making beaker-burner coffee in the lab, as she had many times before. Casimir opened the tin of tuna, squeezed the mayo packet into it and began eating it with a plastic fork. She averted her eyes from this spectacle.

“This is delicious,” he told Weston. 

“Casimir,” Weston said. “I think we might have to close Sao Paulo. Their waste treatment is at 30%. That’s over the tipping point for waste borne outbreaks.”

“Aw, jeez,” he said, tossing his empty tin into the trash. “Not to be gross,” he said, squeezing the last of the mayonnaise into his mouth, “but is the vector, like, e.coli?”

“No, I think it’s hitching a ride on something in the Firmicutes family, beneficial gut bacteria, but I’m not 100% on that. I’ve got my hopes pinned on Mila’s brilliant deductions.” She flashed Antonich a tired, brilliant smile that made her stomach drop.

“Now I go back to work,” Antonich said, putting the water bottle back in the refrigerator. She took a coffee mug from the dish drainer and reached for the pot. 

There was a crash of crockery and a sparkling haze came over the room. Antonich found herself embraced by Peregrine’s wiry arms. How - ? He smelled nice, like a warm body in your bed, but - ugh, Peregrine? He spoke over her head, which inexplicably rested on his shoulder.

“Get that chair over here. Just brace it, Renee. I’ve got her.” 

Then she was sitting in a break room chair, while the ceiling swung back and forth above her lolling head. Peregrine knelt at her side, his arms around her and the chair’s back.

“Doc?” said Weston’s voice, “We need you here right now. Break room. Just come.”

As Antonich got her head under control, she found herself looking into Peregrine’s concerned face. He was wearing eyeliner. Then Weston’s warm hand cradled her jaw while she shone a flashlight into her eyes.

“Just look at me,” she said. “Tell me your name.” 

“I’m fine,” Antonich said.

“Your name and the name of the president.” 

“Mila Elena Antonich. The President is Daya Fuentes-Cortez.” 

“Good,” said Weston, “And tell me the date.”

“You are being ridiculous. I had only a short episode of syncope and, as you can see, now I am fine.”

“Date,” said Weston.

“It is August 21, 2024.” 

Weston looked relieved, but when Antonich tried to get up, pressed her firmly back down to her seat.

“No, no, no, Missy, we are going to have Doc check you out before you go careening off.”

Antonich signed and slumped in the chair. She turned to Peregrine.

“Please, now remove your arms,” she told him. He backed off, with a “look, no hands” gesture, but, she noticed, he crouched close by, ready to catch her.

“What the Hell -” said the Medic, with some irritation, entering the room. “Oh, Mila!

“What happened?” he asked Weston.

“She was reaching to get coffee and she started swaying. Casimir caught her and put her in a chair, but, Doc, she was really out for a minute. I looked at her pupils, they seem equal. She’s appears okay, but I don’t know.”

Now Doc’s callused hand grasped her chin and a new flashlight shone into her eyes. 

“Mm,” he said. “It’s not a stroke.” He pressed his two fingers against her neck. She had always liked Doc; he reminded her of her gruff Uzbek father, whose encouragement of her studies had usually consisted of a single, grunted syllable of appreciation.

“Rapid pulse,” he said. “C’mere, Renee, I’ll show you something.”

He pinched her forearm. 

“See how the skin stays up in a ridge? Sign of dehydration - there’s not enough water in her body to plump it back up.

“When did you last eat and drink?” he asked Antonich.

“I do not have time to keep track of my diet,” she said, and then, sardonically, “I am busy saving humanity.”

“If you don’t save your own sorry skin, you won’t be doing any other saving,” said Doc. “Renee, I’m putting you in charge of this patient. She needs to lie down until tomorrow -”

Antonich began to rise with a protest, but this time, Doc pushed her back down. 

“All right,” he said. “Let’s get a liter of water and salt into you, and a decent meal. If you look any better in two hours, I’ll consider letting you go back to work. Quit your heroics and please remember; as long as you are on this team, I am your doctor.”

~oo0oo~

Back in the women’s quarters, Weston pulled on her pajamas. This was one of her sanity points; she always got undressed to sleep, and always brushed her teeth. She figured that six hours and a hot shower was all she needed to get back to work, so she should be up with the morning light.

Antonich slept deeply in her bunk across the room. Peregrine had scratched up a frozen meal from another floor of the station and they had forced her to drink glass after glass of water. Soon it had been clear that she couldn’t stay awake. Watching her pass directly into REM told Weston how exhausted she had been. 

So deeply asleep. Weston sat on the edge of her own bunk and gazed at her. How well she knew Mila. For instance, if she were to brush aside the honey brown hair that clung to her cheekbone, Mila would startle awake and demand to know, groggily, what was wrong. And so she didn’t, but she wished she could.

Weston cracked the door so the light from the hall would illuminate the room, then she turned off her reading lamp and laid her head down.

~oo0oo~

Weston’s phone alarm vibrated silently under her pillow. Outside the bunkroom window the sky glowed indigo - time to rise. Her eyes sought out Mila’s pale face. Still fast asleep; good. She slipped out of bed and gathered yesterday’s clothes off the floor; she would dress outside and let her friend have a few more hours of rest.

Padding down the hall to the lavatory, she could hear Peregrine’s tuneless breathy whistling in the men’s room on the other side of the fire door. They had met in the first graduating class of Pandemic Response Teams formed by WHO/CDC. She had been a recent epidemiology post-grad and he a detailee from the Air Force, so young he still had acne with his buzz cut. He was a super-smart half-Korean kid from the Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina; she was a super-educated middle-class Black woman from the Upper West Side of New York, yet they took an instant liking to each other and spent most of their training months sitting together and developing the sarcastic humor that sustained them.

It didn’t surprise her that he was up with the sun, if he had slept at all. 

Some PRTs fell apart and were reconstituted as members died or had to be quarantined. The teams functioned as loose cells by design; WHO/CDC were well aware that if the pandemics reached a certain level, communication grids would collapse and local groups would have to be work solo. Team Twelve were lucky to be together after two years - herself, Mila, Casimir, Doc and her brother Flint, their Operations Expert. Flint was in Bogota, putting up another research station. He had Bretton-Klein, Schiffman and Colonel Reemer with him there to begin operations right away. They had hoped to contain the South American outbreak from there, but it wasn’t looking good now. 

Weston finished up, shoved her pajamas in her cubby and went to the break room. Sure enough, Peregrin was there, same clothes as yesterday, his hair stuck back in a little plastic clip.

“Did you get any sleep, Casimir?” she asked.

“Some,” he said. “Sleep and coffee are interchangeable, right?” He dumped yesterday’s cold coffee in the sink, and gave her a conspiratory smirk. “Look what I found on the third floor.” From the pocket of his denim jacket, he withdrew a silver bag with a twist tie folded into the top. 

She stared at it, confused, then with sudden recognition.

“It’s Starbucks! You found Starbucks!”

“Yes!” he crowed. “It was in a desk drawer! It hasn’t even been opened!” For months they had been using the giant cans of dried up office coffee left by the supply company that seemed to come less and less frequently. Many imported items such as coffee and electronics were beginning to disappear from the legitimate market.

“Whoo hoo! We gotta send you pillaging more often!”

“Pillage in the face of worldwide calamity. It’s the way to go!” They high-fived and did a little Funky Chicken around the room.

“What is this “disco” celebration?” Antonich stood in the doorway, scowling. Weston smiled at her; of course she was annoyed to find anyone awake and alert before her.

“We are making you some Starbucks coffee,” said Peregrine, and was gratified to see her eyes widen almost imperceptibly. Weston gestured for her to take a seat and pressed a glass of water into her hands.

“Drink,” she said. 

~oo0oo~

Peregrine had found that if he did not get out of the building at least once a day, something weird and bad happened to his brain. Being cooped up with college grads reminded him of his childhood as the only military-issue, half-Korean kid on the mountain, fighting for respect, always treated like an oddity. Only being under the sky could restore his comfort with himself.

Now he sat on the dry ground by the entrance steps, methodically breaking twigs off a dead bush. If a twig was too long, he broke it in half. There was a small, neat stack of them at his side. 

The Atlanta research station had been freshly landscaped when they arrived two years ago, the bushes sporting plastic tags and the moist mulch neatly arranged. They had been to Kinshasa, Johannesburg, Jakarta, Chicago, L.A., and when they came back, the plants were dead; whomever took care of the building had been sent on to some other task or let go.

Someone sat down on the weeds next to him. He looked up. Mila.

“Thank you for catching me,” she said. “If I had hit my head, it would have damaged the mission, certainly.” 

Peregrine gave a little snort. 

“‘Damaged the mission -’ You know, I also didn’t want you to get hurt, because you’re a human being and I care about you.”

“Yes, I understand.”

“Well,” said Peregrine, “I’m glad you’re on board with being a human being. I wasn’t sure if you thought of yourself that way.”

Antonich gave a little grimace. 

“Look,” said Peregrine, turning toward her. “I know you hate me. Ah, ah, yes, I do - I’m not as stupid as you think. Ugh, I even understand why.

“I’m just sorry that you do. This may surprise you, but I don’t try to annoy you. You think I’m a lightweight, but I care about the mission, and the team. I couldn’t be working with a finer group of human beings and I will always remember this time of my life as the most serious, the most valuable - - that is, unless - you know - “

Antonich had been looking up at the sky. She nodded.

“Mm,” she said, “Unless.”

Peregrine picked up his pile of twigs and flicked them onto the grass. 

“All right,” he said. “Let’s go in.”

They walked silently back to the door. She let him stay by her side.

~oo0oo~

At one in the afternoon, they made the decision to close Sao Paulo. The virus was indeed transmitted through poor sanitation, but according to intel on the ground, there was already unrest; the military was overwhelmed and it was too late to bring in health workers to turn the water treatment around. Weston looked at the glum faces of Team Twelve ranged around the break room table. 

“I’ll call Colonel Reemer,” Weston said. “He’ll want to recall the rest from Bogota when he gives the order.” 

“Do you have a line?” Peregrin asked. “I can patch you through if you have trouble.”

“I’ll try the intranet if I can’t get through on voice.” 

Weston stared at the table top. No one spoke.

“We’re damning those people to Hell. The whole city to Hell,” she said.

“Weston, we decided this,” said Antonich. “It is for the best to sacrifice them.”

“I know. And I’m a Quarantine Specialist, but I hate this part of the job.”

“It is a hard thing,” said Antonich, hesitatingly. “But for this reason we decide together; we share the blame.”

Weston looked at her steadily.

“Thank you, Mila,” She said. She picked up her phone. 

She took it out into the hall, where they could hear her murmuring, first to the Colonel’s adjutant and then, more briskly, to Reemer himself. 

“...close all the roads asap… barricades… support troops, if not…

“What? _What? _Why? Why is he - ? No, don’t - Sorry, Sir. I’ll sign off now, some things to take care of this end.”

They waited for Weston to come and update them. Silence.

Doc got up and went to her. She stood staring at her phone.

“What -” he said.

“Flint is in Sao Paulo! _Flint!_ My brother - “ There was an edge of hysteria in her voice.

“My God,” said Doc.

In a moment they were clustered around her in the hall.

“What -” “Why -”

“How long -” ‘But I thought -”

Peregrine grasped her by the arms. 

“Get him out, Renee,” he said, “And I’ll snatch him.”

“I - “ She stood, frozen.

“Tell him to get a watermelon truck, an Uber, a stolen car or for God’s sake a donkey and get as far out of the city as he can. Head away from the coast; it will be locked down.”

“But -”

“Keep his phone charged and move fast, keep us aware of where he is headed. He needs a mechanical compass as well as a phone. Tell him, as soon as he’s out, take the smallest road he can find into the hills. I’ll call in favors from some buddies.”

Peregrine gave her a shake.

_“GO!”_

“We’re going to save Flint and let Sao Paulo die?” said Renee. “We can’t do that, Casimir. It’s not right.”

“Look, Renee,” Peregrine said urgently, “It’s all we _can_ do. We need you so we can do our jobs, and you need Flint to be alive. Sao Paulo will fend for itself.” 

“He’s right, Renee,” said Doc, “And you know it.”

“I’m going into that dispatch room right now and get my guys moving,” said Casimir. “You find Flint. Remember what I said - head away from the coast, fast. We have maybe two hours before the roads are closed.”

~oo0oo~

They worked frantically for the rest of the afternoon, Peregrine barking and cajoling in the little dispatch room, sending messages, tracking down guys he knew and one with a private plane who had retired to the Brazilian countryside. Weston found Flint, where he was assessing properties for clinic builds, and got him moving. Their contact was intermittent as panic rose in the city. Both of them knew; once the quarantine order became public, there would be chaos and looting and the roads would be jammed. 

Renee sat on the floor in the hall, cradling her phone as if the warmth of her hands could bring her brother back to her. She knew that Flint had gotten a head start in a beater he bought with a paper bag of American dollars, driving with a full can of gasoline in the trunk and hoping not to get rear-ended. Lining the baseboard were Antonich’s personal phone and Doc’s battered tablet - three numbers he could call, but she guessed he was driving Hell-for-leather, or else had hit a block and was running on foot through back streets, no time to talk. 

All around them - Peregrine in the windowless, hardwired room; Weston on the hall floor; Antonich scanning the South American maps she had brought up on the largest monitor - wafted the savor of Doc’s celebrated chili. As soon as they went to their tasks, he had disappeared in his car. The research station campus was almost twenty miles outside Atlanta on a wooded, highly guarded and unmapped campus. This was why they never ordered pizza or went into town. As Weston anxiously checked and rechecked her phones, Doc went into action in the break room. 

“What are you - oh, awesome,” said Peregrine. “You have your own stove.”

“Son, I’ve been waiting for two years to do this,” said Doc, browning the ground beef on his portable burner. “You don’t know how much this stinkin’ microwave has pissed me off.” 

Lined up on the counter were cans of tomatoes, spices, beans, corn meal, flour, baking soda.

“An army travels on its stomach,” said Doc. “I’m not a tech guy like you, but I’m a damn fine chili cook, and we’ll need to eat well before this mission is complete.” 

~oo0oo~

When dinner was ready, they debriefed around the table. Flint had made it outside the ring road to Jaragua just before Route 348 closed. He thought he might be able to find an off-road vehicle and head for the mountains.

That was an hour ago, and now, silence. 

Peregrine had a buddy from the Air Force whose girlfriend’s mother was a ranger in the Serra de Cantareira. She was willing to shelter Flint or, if the panic got as far as the park, go up the Pico do Jaragua, to a hidden hut only the rangers used. If possible, she’d get him further on. But how to guide Flint to a meet-up point? 

“Damn, I wish he’d been a Boy Scout,” said Weston. “I’ll bet he doesn’t even know how to use a compass.”

The predicted rioting and looting had begun. Half of local law enforcement had deserted their assignments and the Brazilian National Guard had been called in. A general curfew was imposed. Peregrine hacked into some surveillance cameras; there were car fires, roaming gangs and desperate groups on foot, carrying suitcases and bundles, walking toward the city limits, where they would be turned back.

“You people better eat this chili,” said Doc. “Stop talking for a minute and appreciate it.”

It was an excellent chili, more fragrant and complex than simply hot, and Doc had set out sharp grated cheddar, chopped onions and sliced jalapenos to add as they saw fit. He had even managed to make cornbread somehow in a frying pan on the burner, and there was an illicit six of beer from the little market that was the closest source of groceries.

“Dang, Doc, did y’all have these pots in your desk this whole time?” asked Peregrine. Weston smiled at how Peregrine’s country boy accent came out when he was impressed.

“Trunk of my car, with the spices. Be prepared. And yes, I was a Boy Scout.”

At ten p.m. they had done all they could. Peregrine had three options on standby, but Flint hadn’t been heard from. Antonich repeatedly refreshed the cameras Peregrine had accessed, but it was hard to see, in the darkness, what was happening on the street. 

“All right,” said Doc. “Who’s taking first watch? We need fresh soldiers in the morning and what we don’t need is to sit around with our thumbs up our asses all night.” 

“I don’t think I can sleep,” said Weston. “Let it be me.”

“No,” said Peregrine. “You’ve had the worst day and we need you for tomorrow. Give me your phone and get some rest. I pinky swear I will wake you if we hear from Flint.”

“He’s right, Weston,” said Antonich. “I need also to sleep, just a few hours. Come to the bunk room now and we will take second watch together later.” 

Weston nodded. She felt as if all her fuses were burnt out; she could hardly think. It made sense.

“Leaving me alone with the last can of beer!” said Peregrine triumphantly.

And then Weston’s phone went off. 

Everyone looked at it.

“It’s a photo,” she said.

On her screen was a grinning selfie of Flint, surrounded by brightly flash-lit ferns and branches. Behind him, a low waterfall. 

~oo0oo~

Peregrine took the first watch anyway, because he had work to do. If the park ranger recognized that waterfall, she might be able to get to him.

In the women’s bunkroom, Weston almost fell over as she put on her pajama bottoms.

“I always change into pajamas, you know,” she told Antonich. “It helps you go to sleep if you change.”

“Yes, I have observed this,” said Antonich. “I don’t need it.” 

It was true; she slept in whatever tee shirt she had worn that day. 

Weston got into bed and rolled over while Antonich turned out the light. It was dark but not completely dark; moonlight spilled through the high window.

Antonich lay quietly, waiting for Weston’s breathing to slow. The short, panicky pants kept coming, one on top of the next, and Weston thrashed around, adjusting her pillow.

“Go to sleep, Renee,” she said. “You need the rest.”

“I know. I can’t. I feel like, if I stop thinking about Flint, he’ll be lost.”

Before she could reconsider, Antonich slipped out of her bed and into Renee’s, spooning around her protectively. 

“Casimir has him. Go to sleep,” she said, and felt Renee relax, her breath deepening, until finally she was a limp, warm bundle. Antonich stayed awake a few minutes more, surprised by herself and by how natural she felt, and then she, too, fell asleep.

~oo0oo~

Apparently there was no second watch or third watch, because when Doc woke himself up, the sky was beginning to grow light. He wandered into the kitchen, ready to give that pipsqueak Peregrine a piece of his mind. 

“Howdy, boss!” said Peregrine. He had scrubbed all the pots and nested them neatly on the counter. 

“Peregrine, the plan was NOT to have you stay up all night,” Doc said. “And I am not your boss.”

“But I was having such a good time!”

“You don’t look it.” In fact, Peregrine’s eyes were distinctly red, and that eye makeup he wore was all smudged. 

Weston and Antonich arrived in the break room soon after, equally annoyed.

“Give me my phone,” said Weston.

“Nothing there,” said Peregrine, “but okay.”

“No news?” asked Antonich.

“I would have gotten you up,” Peregrine assured her. 

The day passed slowly. They did their jobs. Reemer kept the rest of the team in Bogota, securing the facility in case the new-strain COdA-403d spread north. There were tissue samples from Bogota, Lima and Mexico City for Antonich to process. Peregrine rode his Brazilian contacts and developed exit strategies for the Bogota team. Doc made grilled cheese sandwiches and forced them to sit down for lunch.

Weston monitored outbreak reports worldwide and paced with a phone in each hand. Every time she sat down, she got up again, and every walk ended with her sitting again.

At eight-thirty the sun approached the woods on the west side of the campus, sending long shadows across the lawn. Weston sat in the break room writing an email to her African counterpart.

“Hey, Casimir,” she said as he entered, “What news.”

“Team Twelve mood sinking down,” he replied. “I’m going outside to sit for a while. Want to come?”

“Yeah.”

They settled down by Peregrine’s shredded bush. The sky glowed blue and the first stars came out.

“I wish I smoked,” said Peregrine. “This would be a great time to pull out a cigarette.”

“Sorry about your positive health habits,” said Weston. 

Antonich appeared on the path with Doc.

“You are having a private meeting?” she asked.

“Nah, Mila, come sit,” said Peregrine. “Siddown, Doc.” Doc eased himself down on the concrete steps and Antonich on the other side of Weston. They watched the last light from below the horizon gild a bank of clouds. 

“It’s beautiful out,” said Antonich. 

Weston gave a deep sigh. 

“I think it’ll be okay, Renee,” said Peregrine. “No, I really do think so.”

“It could still go so wrong. We don’t even know where he is.” 

Tentatively, Antonich put her arm around Weston’s shoulder. Weston took her other hand. 

“I’m not even commenting on the anticlimax of the century here.” said Peregrine, side-eying them.

A cool breeze stirred the trees.

“I really wish I smoked right now,” said Doc. 

They sat in silence for a time.

“Well, it’s dark,” said Weston, “We should go in, maybe work a little more, get some sleep.”

“Wait, Renee,” said Peregrine.

“I could - do a final check on African stats, before I go to bed,” said Weston.

“Stay out here with us,” said Peregrine. “Wait.”

“But I -”

Far below, at the edge of the campus, headlights turned onto the research station road, paused at the guardhouse and proceeded on.

“Who the heck is com -” Weston said, then stood up with her hand over her mouth. 

The Hummer took its time winding through the trees. Antonich glanced at Peregrine. He grinned back at her.

It pulled up before them and stopped. Weston stood with her hands on her face until a broad-shouldered Black man dressed in rumpled fatigues stepped out of the passenger seat. Then she screamed.

“Flint!”

“My big sis!” He opened his arms wide as she ran to him. “You weren’t worried about me, were you?”

“Oh my God,” she sobbed. “You idiot. I’m so relieved. Oh my God.”

Peregrine gave Antonich, who was wiping her eyes, an amused look. 

“Heart of stone, you,” he said. 

~oo0oo~

Back inside the station, they gathered around for Flint’s tale of escape. 

After he made it to Jaragua, he headed for the Serra de Canteraira in the beater car, until the radiator hose blew. At a convenience store, a guy traded him a barely operating Vespa for the car, the can of gas and the rest of his American dollars. At the park entrance, the rangers had closed all the roads and trails, alerted to the quarantine and fearful of the damage a rioting crowd might cause.

Flint had hidden and slipped into the forest at dusk. “I’m no jungle navigator,” he said. “I figured my best shot was to keep moving uphill and eventually, I don’t know, I’d be at the top of something.”

After several hours of thrashing through undergrowth in the dark, scratched by thorns and bitten by insects, Flint found himself by the waterfall where he took the picture. He hunkered down there for the night.

“I was pretty damn bit up the next day,” he told them. “I had water but nothing else. I figured I’d stay out of sight until something turned up. Maybe eat a Bird of Paradise. And then,” he said, turning to Peregrine, “Your ranger lady shows up in a nice Jeep, calling my name.”

The ranger got Flint to the other side of the park, where another of Peregrine’s buddies waited to drive him to a private landing strip. The retired gentleman with the private plane took him from there to Venezuela, and from there, he snagged a ride on a military transport.

Weston laughed and wept during this story. Antonich took her hand, less awkwardly this time. Doc brought out a hidden bottle of wine, poured them each a coffee mug of it, and stood on a chair to propose a toast.

“We make a damn fine team, and it’s not just because we’re the smartest and the best prepared PRT in two damn worldwide organizations,” he said. “It’s something else. It’s loyalty and respect, and honesty and fun. We excel, and I’m damn glad to know all of you.” 

Antonich looked at each of the four shining faces in turn. Somehow, those faces kept the “unless” at bay. At least for now.


End file.
